At the heart of the Commission’s proposals is a call for developing countries and the international community to enter into a Financing Compact for the Learning Generation and a commitment to transforming education by strengthening performance, fostering innovation, prioritizing inclusion and increasing financing.

The ultimate success of the Learning Generation and its implementation will depend on strong global leadership and the ability of empowered citizens to hold leaders to account for their action or inaction. Therefore, the Commission has one final recommendation as an agenda for action for everyone to play their part in creating the Learning Generation.

Recommendation 12: Ensure leadership and accountability for the Learning Generation

The Financing Compact must be more than words. Action must begin now, and it must be sustained. Ensuring this will require accountability, leadership, and advocacy . To facilitate this and to ensure that countries are given appropriate support by the international community, the Commission recommends that the United Nations General Assembly pass a resolution requesting the Secretary-General to appoint a Special Representative for Education and Children’s Rights tasked with increasing accountability in global education, including through annual reporting to the UN. Their work should be complemented by wider transparency and accountability measures, taken forward by independent organizations, informed by a new transparent framework outlining the responsibilities of developing and development partner governments.

To set the direction for all countries to follow and to sustain momentum, the Commission calls on an initial set of pioneer countries among developing and development partner countries to commit to adopting the recommendations set out in this report. The Commission calls for a global movement to advocate for the rights of everyone to an education and to make the case for educational investment and reform – a movement of young people and families, teachers and faith leaders, communities, civil society and business leaders, and political leaders at all levels.

Finally, to keep education high on the global agenda, the Commission recommends the Secretary-General establish an independent high-level body with the Special Representative as an independent chair to provide global leadership and advocacy and to move the Learning Generation vision forward.

More than ever, education now offers the world the opportunity to secure the future of the global economy and global stability, and to improve the lives of millions of young people. We need to act now to seize this opportunity together.